Brasil
Brazil (Portuguese: Brasil), officially the Federative Republic of Brazil (Portuguese: República Federativa do Brasil), is the largest and most populous country in South America. It is the fifth largest country by geographical area, the fifth most populous country, and the fourth most populous democracy in the world.Its population comprises the majority of the world's Portuguese speakers. Brazil is the only Portuguese-speaking nation in the Americas. Bounded by the Atlantic Ocean on the east, Brazil has a coastline of over 7,491 kilometers (4,655 mi). It is bordered on the north by Venezuela, Suriname, Guyana and the overseas department of French Guiana; on the northwest by Colombia; on the west by Bolivia and Peru; on the southwest by Argentina and Paraguay and on the south by Uruguay. Numerous archipelagos in the Atlantic Ocean are part of the Brazilian territory, such as Fernando de Noronha, Rocas Atoll, Saint Peter and Paul Rocks, and Trindade and Martim Vaz.
Brazil was a colony of Portugal from the landing of Pedro Álvares Cabral in 1500 until its independence in 1822. Initially independent as the Empire of Brazil, the country has been a republic since 1889. The bicameral legislature (now called Congress) dates back to 1824, when the first constitution was ratified. The Constitution defines Brazil as a Federal Republic formed by the union of 26 States, the Federal District and the Municipalities (nowadays more than 5,564).
Brazil is the world's tenth largest economy at market exchange
rates and the ninth largest in purchasing power. Economic reforms have given the country new international projection. It is a founding member of the United Nations, the Union of South American Nations, and the Community of Portuguese Language Countries. The Brazilian population is predominantly Roman Catholic, almost all Portuguese-speaking and multiethnic. Brazil is also home to a diversity of wildlife, natural environments, and extensive natural resources in a variety of protected habitats.
Wildlife
Scarlet Macaw
The Macaw is a typical animal of Brazil. The country has one of the world's most diverse populations of birds and amphibians.
Brazil's large territory comprises different ecosystems, such as the Amazon Rainforest, recognized as having the greatest biological diversity in the world; the Atlantic Forest and the Cerrado, which together sustain some of the world's greatest biodiversity. In the South, the Araucaria pine forest grows under temperate conditions. The rich wildlife of Brazil reflects the variety of natural habitats; however, remains largely unknown, and new species are found on nearly a daily basis. Scientists estimate that the total number of plant and animal species in Brazil could approach four million. Larger mammals include pumas, jaguars, ocelots, rare bush dogs, and foxes. Peccaries, tapirs, anteaters, sloths, opossums, and armadillos are abundant. Deer are plentiful in the south, and monkeys of many species abound in the northern rain forests.
Concern for the environment in Brazil has grown in response to global interest in environmental issues. Its natural heritage is extremely threatened by to cattle ranching and agriculture, logging, mining, resettlement, oil and gas extraction, over-fishing, expansion of urban centres, wildlife trade, fire, climate change, dams and infrastructure, water contamination, and invasive species. In many areas of the country, the natural environment is threatened by development. Construction of highways has opened up previously remote areas for agriculture and settlement; dams have flooded valleys and inundated wildlife habitats; and mines have scarred and polluted the landscape.
Economy
São Paulo, the wealthiest and largest city of the country.
Brazil is the largest national economy in Latin America, the world's tenth largest economy at market exchange rates and the ninth largest in purchasing power parity (PPP), according to the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank; with large and developed agricultural, mining, manufacturing and service sectors, as well as a large labor pool. The country has been expanding its presence in international financial and commodities markets, and is regarded as one of the group of four emerging economies called BRIC. The country is member of Mercosul, the Southern Common Market, founded in 1991. Its purpose is to promote free trade and the fluid movement of goods, people, and currency. Brazilian exports are booming, creating a new generation of tycoons. Major export products include aircraft, coffee, automobiles, soybean, iron ore, orange juice, steel, ethanol, textiles, footwear, corned beef and electrical equipment. The biggest investment boom in history is under way; in 2007, Brazil launched a four-year plan to spend $300 billion to modernise its road network, power plants and ports. Brazil's booming economy is shifting into overdrive, with biofuels and deep-water oil providing energy independence and the government collecting enough cash to irrigate the desert and pave highways across the Amazon Rainforest. Brazil had pegged its currency, the real, to the U.S. dollar in 1994. However, after the East Asian financial crisis, the Russian default in 1998 and the series of adverse financial events that followed it, the Brazilian central bank temporarily changed its monetary policy to a managed-float scheme while undergoing a currency crisis, until definitively changing the exchange regime to free-float in January 1999.
Brazil received an International Monetary Fund rescue package in mid-2002 in the amount of $30.4 billion, a record sum at that time. The IMF loan was paid off early by Brazil's central bank in 2005 (the due date was scheduled for 2006). One of the issues the Brazilian central bank is currently dealing with is the excess of speculative short-term capital inflows to the country in the past few months, which might explain in part the recent downfall of the U.S. dollar against the real in the period. Nonetheless, foreign direct investment (FDI), related to long-term, less speculative investment in production, is estimated to be $193.8 billion for 2007. Inflation monitoring and control currently plays a major role in Brazil's Central Bank activity in setting out short-term interest rates as a monetary policy measure. In 2007, the trade balance was $43.6 billion surplus. Exports: $159.2 billion. Major markets: United States (15.8%), Argentina (9.0%), and China (6.7%). Imports: $115.6 billion. Major suppliers: United States 15.7%, China 10.5%, and Argentina 8.6%.
Components
Itaipu Dam, the world's largest hydroelectric plant by energy generation.
Brazil's "investment grade" economy is diverse,encompassing agriculture, industry, and a multitude of services. Brazil is finally punching its weight with a booming economy and stronger global leadership. The recent economic strength has been due in part to a global boom in commodities prices with exports from beef to soybeans soaring. Its prospects have been helped by huge oil and gas discoveries. A global power in agriculture and natural resources, Brazil unleashed the greatest burst of prosperity it has witnessed in three decades. Proven mineral resources are extensive. Large iron and manganese reserves are important sources of industrial raw materials and export earnings. Deposits of nickel, tin, chromite, bauxite, beryllium, copper, lead, tungsten, zinc, gold, and other minerals are exploited.
Agriculture and allied sectors like forestry, logging and fishing accounted for 5.1% of the gross domestic product in 2007. A performance that puts agribusiness in a position of distinction in terms of Brazil's trade balance, in spite of trade barriers and subsidizing policies adopted by the developed countries. Brazil enjoyed a positive agricultural trade balance of $40 billion in 2007. The country is the world's largest producer of sugar cane, coffee, tropical fruits, frozen concentrated orange juice, and has the world's largest commercial cattle herd. Brazil is the second most important producer of soybeans, corn, cotton, cocoa, tobacco, and forest products. The industry; from automobiles, steel and petrochemicals to computers, aircraft, and consumer durables; accounted for 30.8% of the gross domestic product. Industry is highly concentrated geographically, with the leading concentrations in metropolitan São Paulo, Rio de Janeiro, Curitiba, Campinas, Porto Alegre, Belo Horizonte, Salvador, Recife and Fortaleza. Technologically advanced industries are also highly concentrated in these locations.
Brazil is the world's tenth largest energy consumer. It's energy comes from renewable sources, particularly hydroelectricity and ethanol; and nonrenewable sources, mainly oil and natural gas. The country is one of the world's leading producers of hydroelectric power. Of its total installed electricity-generation capacity of 90,000 megawatts, hydropower accounts for 66,000 megawatts (74%). Brazil will become an oil superpower, with massive oil discoveries in recent times.
Science and technology
An Embraer Legacy 600 jet airliner, developed in Brazil.
Brazilian science effectively began in the first decades of the 19th century, when the Portuguese Royal Family, headed by John VI, arrived in Rio de Janeiro, escaping from the Napoleon's army invasion of Portugal in 1807. Until then, Brazil was a Portuguese colony, without universities, and a lack of cultural and scientific organizations, in stark contrast to the former American colonies of the Spanish Empire, which although having a largely illiterate population like Brazil and Portugal, had, however, a number of universities since the 16th century.
Technological research in Brazil is largely carried out in public universities and research institutes. Nonetheless, more than 73% of funding for basic research still comes from government sources.Some of Brazil's most notables technological hubs are the Oswaldo Cruz Institute, the Butantan Institute, the Air Force's Aerospace Technical Center, the Brazilian Agricultural Research Corporation and the INPE. Brazil has the most advanced space program in Latin America, with significant capabilities to launch vehicles, launch sites and satellite manufacturing. On 14 October 1997, the Brazilian Space Agency signed an agreement with NASA to provide parts for the ISS. Uranium is enriched at the Resende Nuclear Fuel Factory to fuel the country's energy demands. Plans are on the way to build the country's first nuclear submarine. Brazil is one of the three countries in Latin America with an operational Synchrotron Laboratory, a research facility on physics, chemistry, material science and life sciences.
Demographics
Brazilian people.
Brazil's population comes from many racial and ethnic groups. The last National Research for Sample of Domiciles (PNAD) census revealed the following: 49.7% of the population self-identified as White, about 93 million; 42.6% Pardo (meaning brown in Portuguese), about 79 million; 6.9% Black, about 13 million; 0.5% Asian, about 1 million; and 0.3% Amerindian, about 519,000. Most Brazilians can trace their ancestry to the country's indigenous Amerindians, Portuguese colonists, or African slaves, either alone, in combination with one or both of the others, and/or in combination with other ethnic or racial groups. Since the arrival of the Portuguese in the 1500s, this miscegenation between the three groups has been a part of the evolution of the people of Brazil. In the over three centuries of Portuguese colonization, Brazil received more than 700,000 Portuguese settlers and 4 million African slaves.Starting in the late 19th century, Brazil opened its doors to immigration: people of over 60 nationalities immigrated to Brazil. About 5 million European and Asian immigrants arrived from 1870 to 1953, most of them from Italy, Portugal, Spain, and Germany. In the early 20th century, people from Japan and the Middle-East also arrived. The immigrants and their descendants had an important impact in the ethnic composition of the Brazilian population, and many diasporas are present in the country.
Brazil has the largest population of Italian origin outside of Italy, with over 25 million Italian Brazilians, the largest Japanese population outside of Japan, with 1.6 million Japanese Brazilians, the largest Arab population outside of the Middle East, with 10 million Arab Brazilians. As well the second largest German population outside of Germany, with 12 million German Brazilians, the second largest Spanish population outside of Spain, with 15 million Spanish Brazilians, the second largest Polish population outside of Poland, with 1.8 million Polish Brazilians. However, the largest and oldest European ethnic group in Brazil is the Portuguese Brazilian, and most Brazilians can trace their ancestry to an ethnic Portuguese or a mixed-race Portuguese. A characteristic of Brazil is the race mixing. Genetically, most Brazilians have some degree of European, African, and Amerindian ancestry. The entire population can be considered a single "Brazilian" ethnic group, with highly varied racial types and backgrounds, but without clear ethnic sub-divisions.
About 81.3% of Brazilians live in an urban area. The metropolitan areas are São Paulo, Rio de Janeiro, and Belo Horizonte, respectively with 19.7, 11.4, and 5.4 million inhabitants. In 2007, fourteen cities had more than 1 million residents, and six global cities had over 2 million (São Paulo, Rio de Janeiro, Salvador, Brasília, Fortaleza, and Belo Horizonte). Almost all the capitals are the largest city in their corresponding state, except for Vitória, the capital of Espírito Santo, and Florianópolis, the capital of Santa Catarina. There are also non-capital metropolitan areas in the states of São Paulo (Campinas, Santos and the Paraíba Valley), Minas Gerais (Steel Valley), Rio Grande do Sul (Sinos Valley), and Santa Catarina (Itajaí Valley).
